1731 ANNA IVANOVNA Russian Empress Antique Denga 1/2 Kopek Coin Eagle i56452

Item: i56452
 
 Authentic Coin of:

Russia

Anna Ivanovna – Empress: 30 January 1730 – 28 October 1740
1731 Copper Denga (1/2 Kopek) 25mm (7.30 grams)
Reference: KM# 188
Royal coat of arms, the crowned imperial double eagle with scepter and orb.
ДЕНГА 1731 within decorative wreath.

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Authenticity.

Anna
Ioannovna (Russian:
Анна Иоанновна; 7 February [O.S.
28 January] 1693 – 28 October [O.S.
17 October] 1740), also spelled
Anna Ivanovna and
sometimes
anglicized
as Anne, was regent of the
duchy of Courland
from 1711 until 1730 and then
ruled as
empress of Russia
from 1730 to 1740.

Early life

Anna was born in
Moscow
as the daughter of Tsar
Ivan V
by his wife
Praskovia Saltykova
. Although Anna’s father was
himself Tsar of Russia and co-ruler with his brother
Peter I
, he was mentally disabled and incapable
of administering the country. Therefore, his younger brother and co-ruler was
effectively the autocrat of all the Russias. Anna’s father Ivan V died in
February 1696, when Anna was only three years old, and
her uncle
became the sole ruler of Russia.

Although Anna was the fourth child of her parents, she had only one surviving
elder sister,
Catherine
, and one younger sister,
Praskovya
. The three girls were raised in a
disciplined and austere manner by their widowed mother, a very stern lady of
sterling character. Born into a family of relatively modest means,
Praskovia Saltykova
had been an exemplary wife
to a mentally challenged man, and expected her daughters to live up to her own
high standards of morality and virtue. Anna grew up within a milieu which
cherished womanly virtue and domesticity above all else, and strongly emphasized
thrift, charity and religious observances. Her education consisted of French,
German, religious texts and folklore, leavened with some music and dancing. As
she grew older, she developed into an obstinate girl, with a mean streak,
earning her the nickname “Iv-anna the Terrible”. Anna was famed for her big
cheek, “which, as shown in her portraits,” says
Thomas Carlyle
, “was comparable to a
Westphalian
ham”.

In time, her uncle
Peter the great
ordered the family to move from
Moscow to
St. Petersburg
. This meant a change of not just
location but also society, and this had a significant effect on Anna. She
greatly enjoyed the splendor of court and the lavishness of high society, which
was very different from the austerity preferred by her mother.

Wedding and widowhood

In 1710,
Peter the Great
arranged for the 17-year-old
Anna to marry
Frederick William
,
Duke of Courland
, who was the same age as her
Her wedding was held on a grand scale, as per her own inclinations, and her
uncle gave her a fabulous dowry of 200,000 roubles. At the feast which followed
the wedding, two dwarfs performed a parody by jumping out of enormous pies and
dancing on the tables.

The newly wedded couple spent several weeks in Russia before proceeding to
Courland. Only twenty miles out of St. Petersburg, on the road to Courland, Duke
Frederick died. The cause of death was uncertain – it has been attributed
variously to a chill or to the effects of alcohol.

After her husband died, Anna proceeded to
Jelgava
, the capital
Courland
(now western
Latvia
) and ruled that province for almost
twenty years, from 1711 to 1730. During this period, the Russian resident,
Peter Bestuzhev
, was her adviser (and sometimes
lover). She never remarried after the death of her husband, but her enemies said
she conducted a love affair with
Ernst Johann von Biron
, a prominent courtier,
for many years.

Accession

 

In 1730,
Tsar Peter II
(grandson of
Peter the Great
) died childless at a young age.
His death made extinct the main line of the
Romanov dynasty
, which had ruled Russia for
over a century, since 1613. Possible candidates for the throne were the three
surviving daughters of
Ivan V
, namely
Catherine
(b.1691), Anna (b.1693) and
Praskovya
(b.1694), and the two surviving
daughters of
Peter the great
, namely
Anna
(b.1708) and
Elizabeth
(b.1709).

Ivan V had been the older brother of Peter the Great and co-ruler with him,
and by that reckoning, his daughters may be considered to have the prior right.
However, if seen from the perspective that the successor should be the nearest
kin of the most recent monarch, then the daughters of Peter the great were
nearer to the throne, because they were the aunts of the recently deceased
Tsar Peter II
. The dilemma was made greater
because the daughters of Peter the Great had been born out of wedlock, and had
been legitimized later by him, after he formally married their mother
Catherine I
, who had previously been a maid in
his household. On the other hand,
Praskovia Saltykova
, the wife of Ivan V, had
been a nobleman’s daughter and a devoted wife and mother; moreover, she had been
a lady greatly respected for her many virtues, not least her chastity.

 

 

Finally, the Russian
Supreme Privy Council
led by Prince
Dmitri Golitzyn
selected Anna, the second
daughter of Ivan V, to be the new Empress of Russia. She was selected in
preference to her elder sister
Catherine
even though Catherine was at that
time resident in Russia whereas Anna was not. There were some reasons for this:
Anna was a childless widow and there was no immediate danger of an unknown
foreigner wielding power in Russia; she also had some experience of government,
because she had been administering her late husband’s duchy of
Courland
for almost two decades. Catherine on
the other hand was married to the
Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin
; she was now
separated from him and living in Russia, but this was in itself disgraceful; and
whether her husband was present or absent, his existence could raise problems at
her very coronation. His intervention at some later point could hardly be
prevented, especially since Catherine had a daughter by him; and being a ruling
prince of ancient lineage, he would not be as amenable to the council’s advice
as a Russian princess. Also, the fact that Catherine had a daughter already
would provide a certainty of succession which the nobles perhaps preferred not
to have.

The
Supreme Privy Council
preferred the childless
and widowed Duchess of Courland. They hoped that she would feel indebted to the
nobles and remain a figurehead at best, and malleable at worst. To make sure of
that, the Council convinced Anna to sign a declaration of “Conditions”
to her accession, modeled after a Swedish precedent, which stated that Anna was
to govern according to their counsel and was not permitted to start war, call
for peace, create new taxes or spend the revenue generated by the state without
their consent. She could not punish nobility without trial, could not make
grants of estates or villages, could not appoint high officials, and could not
promote anyone, whether foreigners or Russians, to court offices without the
consent of the Council.

Anna signed the document of “Conditions”
on 18 January 1730 at her capital,
Jelgava
in Courland (then known as Mitau), and
proceeded to the Russian capital. On 20 February 1730, shortly after her
arrival, Empress Anna exercised her prerogative to do away with her
predecessor’s Privy Council and dissolved that body. The Supreme Privy Council
which had stipulated those onerous “Conditions” had been composed largely of the
families of the princes Dolgorouki and Galitzin. Within a matter of days,
another faction rose at court which was opposed to the domination of these two
families. On 7 March 1730, a group of people belonging to this faction
(numbering between 150 and 800 people, depending on source) arrived at the
palace and petitioning the empress to repudiate the “Conditions” and assume the
autocracy of her predecessors. Among those who urged Anna to do so was her elder
sister
Catherine
. Anna duly repudiated the
document of Conditions
, and for good measure
sent some of the framers of the document to the scaffold, and many others to
Siberia
. She then assumed autocratic powers and
ruled as an absolute monarch, in the same fashion as her predecessors.

Policies

 

 

Anna continued lavish architectural advances in St. Petersburg. She completed
a waterway that began construction under Peter the Great and called for
seafaring ships to accompany this new canal and continue naval expansion.

Cadet Corps

Anna founded the Cadet Corps in 1731, one year after coming to the throne.
The Cadet Corps was a group of young boys starting at the age of eight being
trained for the military. There was a very rigorous training program and this
also included all the schooling that was necessary for someone to be in an
important position in the military. As time went on though, the program was
later improved by other emperors and empresses, such as Catherine the Great.
They began to include the arts and sciences into their schooling, rather than
just the knowledge that is considered necessary for only a career in the
military.

Academy of Science

Started by Peter the Great, Anna continued to fund the
Russian Academy of Science
. The point of this
school was to further the sciences in Russia and to help bring the country that
was so far behind up to where the Western Countries were. Some of the sciences
that were taught were mathematics, astronomy, and botany. The Academy of Science
was also responsible for a lot of the expeditions, specifically to the Bering
Sea. The Bering Sea Expedition is one of the more famous ones that was done by
the Academy of Science. While they were trying to find out if America and Asia
had been at one point connected, they also studied Siberia and its people, these
studies were used long after they returned from Siberia. But there were also
some troubles for the scientists. Oftentimes, the government and the church
would meddle in their funding and their experiments, changing the data to how
they wanted to see it. This school of science was very small, never exceeding a
population of twelve students in the university and barely over a hundred in the
secondary school. But still it was a huge step forward for education in Russia.
Many of the teachers and professors were imported from Germany bringing more of
a Western feeling to what the students were learning about. Some of the students
to learn from these German professors later became advisors or teachers to some
of the future leaders, such as Catherine the Great’s tutor, Adodurov. During
Anna’s reign, the Academy of Science began to include the Arts into their
program. For not only was there not a school for the arts yet, but Anna was a
firm supporter of the arts. Theater, architecture, engraving, and journalism
were all added to the curriculum. During this time, the foundations of what is
now the world famous Russian Ballet was laid down as well.

The Secret
Office of Investigation

There have been many rumors since the time of Anna’s reign that Biron had a
large impact on this office, but truly it was run by the senator A. I. Ushakov.
This office was resurrected during Anna’s reign to punish those for political
crimes mostly, but sometimes they would take cases that were not as political.
The punishments that came from the crimes that were committed, were often very
painful and disgusting. For example, some people that had supposedly been
plotting against the government had their noses slit as well as being beaten
with the knout. Russian authorities listed a total of around 20,000
Russians—including some of the highest native nobility—fell victim to Biron and
Anna’s police.

Nobility

Anna gave many privileges to those that were considered the nobility. In
1730, she made sure that the law of Peter the Great outlawed states from being
subdivided, the primogeniture law, was repealed. Starting in 1731, landlords
were responsible for their serfs’ taxes, and their economic bondage was
tightened again. In 1736, when the age of service changed to 20 with a 25-year
service time, Anna and her government also determined that if the family had
more than one son, one could stay behind so that he could work the estate.

Westernization

Westernization continued after Peter the Great’s reign in areas of prominent
Western culture such as the Academy of Science, cadet corps education, and
imperial culture including theater and opera. Although not at the fast-paced
speed of Westernization under her Uncle Peter’s reign, it is evident that a
culture of the expansion of knowledge continued during Anna’s rule and affected
mostly nobility. It is argued that this success in Westernization is due to the
efforts of the German court nobility; the foreigners’ impacts are viewed both
positively and negatively.

Anna’s reign is different from that of other imperial Russian rulers in one
respect: her court was almost entirely made up of foreigners, the majority of
whom were German. Some observers have argued that historians isolate her rule
from Russian history due to their long-term prejudice towards Germans, towards
whom Anna seems to have had a soft corner.

There is a lot of mention of Germans throughout the reign of Anna. For
example, she often gave them ruling positions in her cabinet and other important
decision making positions. This was because she had very little trust in the
Russians. It was because of this strong German influence in government that many
Russians came to resent them.

Foreign affairs

During Anna’s reign, Russia became involved in two major conflicts, the
War of the Polish Succession
and the
Turkish wars
. In the former, Russia worked with
Austria
to support
Augustus II
‘s son
Augustus
against the candidacy of
Stanisław Leszczyński
, who was dependent on the
French
and amiable with
Sweden
and
Turkey
. Russia’s involvement with the conflict
was quickly over, however, and the
1736–39 Crimean War
was much more important.

In 1732,
Nader Shah
had forced Russia to return parts of
the lands in the
Northern
and
Southern

Caucasus
and in northern mainland
Persia
that had been taken during Peter the
Great’s
Russo-Persian War
; this
Treaty of Resht
permitted an alliance against
the Ottoman Empire and, in any case, the provinces of
Shirvan
,
Ghilan
, and
Mazanderan
had been a net drain on the imperial
treasury for the entirety of their occupation. Three years later in 1735,
conforming to the
Treaty of Ganja
, all the rest of the
territories taken more than a decade earlier from Persia in the North and South
Caucasus were returned.

The war against the Turks took four and a half years, a hundred thousand men,
and millions of rubles; its burdens caused great stress on the people of Russia;
and it only gained Russia the city of

Azov and its environs. Its effects, however, were greater than they
first appeared. Osterman’s policy of southern expansion prevailed over the 1711
Peace of Pruth
signed by Peter the Great;
Münnich had given Russia its first campaign against Turkey that had not ended in
crushing disaster and dissipated the illusion of Ottoman invincibility; he had
further shown that Russia’s
grenadiers
and
hussars
could defeat twice their number of
janissaries
and
spahis
. The Tatar hordes of the
Crimea
had been exterminated and Russia’s
signal and unexpected successes greatly increased its prestige within Europe.

The Russians also established a protectorate over the khan of the
Kirghiz
, sending officers to assist his
short-lived conquest of
Khiva
.

A
Chinese
embassy to her court at St Petersburg
was the only one ever dispatched to Europe through the late 19th century.

Relationship with
Biron

 

After being widowed weeks after her wedding, Anna never remarried; as empress
of Russia she enjoyed the power she held over all men, and may have thought that
marriage would undermine her power and position. Nevertheless, Anna’s reign is
often referred to as “The Age of Biron” (Bironovschina),
after her German lover
Ernst Johann Biron
. Historians aver that Biron
not only had a strong influence on Anna’s domestic and foreign policies, but
also that at times, he wielded power solely, without reference to the Empress.
Anna was attracted to Biron’s personal charm and he proved to be a good
companion to her, but his name became synonymous with cruelty and terror. In
public perception, these negative qualities became the hallmark of Anna’s reign.

Death and succession

As her health declined, Anna declared her grandnephew,
Ivan VI
, should succeed her, and appointed
Biron as regent. This was an attempt to secure the line of her father,
Ivan V
, and exclude the descendants of
Peter the Great
from inheriting the throne. It
was recorded that she had an ulcer on her kidneys. She continued having attacks
of gout, and as her condition worsened, her health began to fail.

Anna died on October 17, 1740, from a terrible kidney stone that made for a
slow and painful death. The tsaritsa’s final words focused on Biron. She died at
the age of 47 of
kidney disease
.
Ivan VI
was only a two-month-old baby at the
time, and his mother,
Anna Leopoldovna
, was detested for her German
counsellors and relations. As a consequence, shortly after Anna’s death
Elizabeth Petrovna
,
Peter I
‘s legitimized daughter managed to gain
the favor of the populace, locked Ivan VI in a dungeon, and exiled his mother.
Anna was buried three months later on January 15, 1741, leaving behind
uncertainty for the future of Russia.

Legacy

 

In the West, Anna’s reign was traditionally looked on as a continuation of
the transition from the old Muscovy ways to the European court envisioned by
Peter the Great
. Her government, on the whole,
was prudent, beneficial and even glorious; but it was undoubtedly severe and
became at last universally unpopular. Within Russia, Anna’s reign is often
referred to as a “dark era”. The issue with Anna’s reign derives from her
personality flaws. Even considering the need of Russian rulers to avoid displays
of weakness, Anna’s rule involved questionable acts towards her subjects. She
was known to enjoy hunting animals from the palace windows and on more than a
few occasions humiliated individuals with disabilities. There were continued
issues with serfdom, peasant and low class slavery, taxation, dishonesty, and
rule through constant fear. Her empire was described by Lefort, the Saxon
minister, as being “comparable to a storm-threatened ship, manned by a pilot and
crew who are all drunk or asleep. . . with no considerable future.” Anna’s war
with Turkey, economic issues, and conspiracy revolving around her accession all
bring to light an ominous glow of the empress’s reign. She restored the courts
in St. Petersburg and brought Russia’s political atmosphere back to where Peter
the Great had intended progress; the grandeur was almost unmatched in Europe or
Asia; but such lavish court life was overshadowed by the thousands of men
slaughtered in war. It is undeniable she had a vast impact in science and
culture, but it came with a price. The positive aspects of Anna’s reign are
typically ignored, though it is important to note that she had no more influence
on domestic and foreign relations and policies than any other 18th-century
ruler.